


Gentle

by Everything4Everyone



Series: Gentle [2]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders-centric, Anxious Anxiety | Virgil Sanders, Fluff, Gen, Gentle Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Kind Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Motherly Deceit | Janus Sanders, Sympathetic Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Understanding Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:28:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26221885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Everything4Everyone/pseuds/Everything4Everyone
Summary: On a simple outing, the other sides get an opportunity to see Remus's gentle side when it comes to Virgil. Pure fluff.
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders & Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders
Series: Gentle [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1904386
Comments: 7
Kudos: 165





	Gentle

It was a rare calm day for all the sides. They’d all decided to make a trip into the Imagination, which Roman had carefully shaped into a beautiful forest. Patton had packed a picnic which really shouldn’t have all fit into one basket but somehow did, and the others were just along for the ride. The only ones who really needed any convincing to come had been Virgil and Janus, who were both reluctant to come for different reasons. But between all of them, they’d gotten the two loner traits to come, and now they were all in the forest, doing their own thing. 

Patton had enlisted Logan’s help in setting up the picnic, the two of them trying to figure out how everything worked and blushing periodically as they brushed against each other for something or other.

Roman was dramatically telling a story to Janus, who was giving his very sarcastic input every three seconds or so, much to the fanciful side’s annoyance, and Remus was being his crazy self while Virgil laid on his back and watched the clouds pass by.

Everything was peaceful… mostly. Nothing involving Remus could ever truly be peaceful. But everything was rather calm, and sort of peaceful. 

But then Remus had an idea.

Bouncing on his heels, he swung down from the tree he was in, landing right behind Virgil’s head. Leaning forward, he blocked the anxious trait’s view of the clouds, and waited until his eyes fixed upon his instead of staring blankly ahead. “I have an idea!” He cheered, and the whole thing came to a stop.

Janus watched them warily, ready to jump in at a moment’s notice. After the whole washing machine incident all those years ago, he had never let himself get distracted from them again. Remus had gentled, fortunately, but only toward Virgil, and Janus still watched them like a hawk, scared that one day Remus would forget and be too rough. Those early years when he’d never been gentle had been hard on Virgil, and Janus wouldn’t let that happen again.

Roman was terrified. His brother’s ideas were always terrible, were often violent, and were usually rough enough that even Roman could barely handle them. Virgil wasn’t as tough as he was, and was far more sensitive. And Roman knew his brother, knew that he had never gone easy on someone just for being sensitive. He wouldn’t even hold back when “playing” with Patton, and Patton was the gentlest of all of them! He couldn’t help but be worried.

Patton was just as worried as them, eyes wide in fright. He remembered the few times Remus had “played” with him before, and they usually ended up with him either hurt or in tears, or both. He knew he was the gentlest, but Virgil was the most sensitive, and about far more delicate subjects. Remus had been with Virgil for a long time; he likely knew all of the anxious trait’s fears and how to take advantage of them.

And Logan was worried as well, despite telling himself it was illogical. Remus could hurt Virgil, and it was very likely he knew how to injure him better than anyone. Logan had grown to greatly care about the youngest trait, and he had no wish to see him harmed. 

Virgil blinked up at the green-clad trait. “An idea?” He asked.

Remus nodded enthusiastically. “An idea! We could play monster tag! I make monsters and they chase you and if they catch you then you’re dead and the game is over! You could use your reflexes and we could use the others as obstacles! What do you say?!”

Patton felt his eyes widen. That sounded terrible! Monsters were scary, and being chased by them was even worse, and they’d be going after everyone! He didn’t want to do that!

But it didn’t really seem like he had a choice. Once Remus made up his mind, there was no changing it.

Virgil sat up, turning around to face the maniacally grinning side. “Um… I’d rather not, if you don’t mind,” he said, and it was so calm that Roman felt his mouth drop. He’d lived with Remus before, what was he doing? He knew there was no changing his mind once he’d got an idea!

Then, to everyone’s surprise, Remus’s face dropped. “Aww…” he dropped down to the ground, crouching in front of the dark trait strangely. “Why not?”

Virgil looked down, fingers picking at the sleeves of his jacket. “I don’t know. I guess… I’m just feeling kinda peaceful today and would rather not do anything exhausting.”

Remus’s face dropped even more, and he crouched a bit lower, staring Virgil right in the face, searching for any sign of lying. He didn’t find any, and he was about to jump up and go do find someone else to play with, when he saw it. Fear. Virgil was much better at hiding it now, but he was still afraid of Remus, and he felt all his annoyance and disappointment felt away at the reminder. 

Sometimes he forgot that he had to be gentle with Virgil now. Sometimes he still tried to play rough. He would forget that if he wanted to play rough, he’d have to go find someone else to play with. Virgil needed him to be gentle, and if Remus wanted to play with him, he’d have to find something gentle he could do.

He… wasn’t very good at being gentle. He was naturally rough and crazy and wild, and that was just the way he was. But for Virgil… he was willing to make an exception. 

“Okay. What if instead, we make flower crowns! I can go find the flowers so you won’t even have to move and then we could give them to everybody! You could even tell me what kinds you want and I could make them for you! We could do all sorts of colors and add all sorts of things and ooh! We could make a thorny one! Maybe roses or even just branches! What do you think?”

Everyone stared. Roman felt his jaw drop even lower. Remus had… accepted that? He had never seen his brother change his mind before, but here he was, playing… it was almost like he was being gentle. 

Why? How? Even Janus couldn’t make Remus change his mind once he decided on something, and he never took no for an answer. If Roman tried to stop him then Remus would fight him. 

Why had he changed his mind? How had he done it? He hadn’t even known his brother was capable of changing his mind, and here he had done it so easily! He hadn’t even argued, he’d just discarded his idea and came up with a few one… how?

Logan sat down hard, brain frozen. To his knowledge, Remus had never changed his mind before unless there was a much better option presented. It was illogical for his behavior to change so suddenly out of nowhere. What had changed? What was the variable that gentled him? What was different now then all the other times? He hadn’t even been gentle with  _ Patton, _ who even Janus and Virgil had never hurt. Who could ever even  _ dream _ of hurting him? Yet Remus had, but now he was being gentle. He couldn’t understand it.

Patton was confused. He’d never seen Remus change his mind before. He had never known him to be gentle. He hadn’t even expected him to suggest flower crowns! He’d been gearing up to run from monsters, sure that Remus would get angry at the refusal and go twice as hard on everyone, not for him to suddenly switch gears and make such a calm suggestion.

Janus sighed in relief, allowing a smile to twitch at the corner of his mouth. It was good to know that Remus hadn’t forgotten. He’d kept it in mind all those long years that Virgil needed to be treated gently, and had never even once gone against that. “You’re  _ not _ a good boy, Remus,” he called out, ignoring how everyone’s attention snapped toward him. “You  _ don’t  _ get a treat during the picnic, okay?”

Remus jumped into the air in excitement, before quickly returning his attention to Virgil, who still hadn’t answered, and crouching again, giving the impression of an overeager puppy.

Virgil couldn’t help but smile. “Okay. Flower crowns sound good.”

Everyone watched in baffled amusement as Remus jumped almost three feet in the air and set out running to every flower patch he could find, picking as many of each kind as he could carry and running them back to Virgil, uncaring of how high the stack grew.

Roman turned to Janus, the only one who had seemed to know what was going on. “What the he-um, heck was that! How did he act so…” 

He struggled for a moment, before Janus interjected “Gentle?” 

He nodded vigorously. “Yes! That! How? Why? What… I don’t understand!”

Janus smiled at him, looking fondly over to where Remus had finally sat down and was conjuring the flowers that Virgil wanted, his own half-made and mangled flower crown sitting on his lap. 

“I would also like the answer to this conundrum,” Logan spoke up, Patton nodding eagerly beside him.

Janus shrugged, looking back at them. “Remus was  _ always  _ this way. He  _ wasn’t  _ never gentle. There  _ wasn’t  _ an incident a few years ago and Virgil certainly  _ didn’t _ nearly die. Since then, Remus  _ hasn’t _ been gentle with him and has  _ never _ been careful.”

There were a few seconds where everyone tried to figure out what exactly Janus said, and then Roman blinked, stunned. “So, you’re telling me that Remus is gentle with Virgil because there was an incident where Virgil almost died?”

Janus grinned. “ _ No. _ Virgil certainly  _ isn’t _ the only one Remus knows how to be gentle with and you all know that Remus is  _ always  _ gentle with anyone else.”

Roman looked over at the pair with new eyes. Virgil was now helping Remus make one out of what looked like thorny branches, mouth moving as he explained something to the dark creative trait.

Squealing quietly, Patton bounced up and down. That was so  _ sweet! _ He hadn’t known that Remus even had the capability to understand that he could hurt people and that hurt didn’t always go away, but then he learned something like this!

Clearing his throat, Logan fixed his glasses, turning his gaze to the deceitful trait. “Does Virgil have the capability to stop Remus from hurting others?” He asked, hands itching to make notes on everything he was learning. 

Janus nodded. “ _ No. _ he has  _ never  _ stopped him from hurting others and certainly  _ didn’t  _ just do it.”

Roman blinked again as he understood. The game that Remus had wanted to play could have hurt them as well. Virgil had stopped it.

They all saw the relationship between Remus and Virgil in a new light.

* * *

And when later, they all ended up with several flower crowns, none of them protested, knowing it could have been so much worse. And whenever they saw Remus doing something completely out of character, like brushing Virgil’s hair or finger painting the walls or even just sitting upside-down on a  _ gently _ swinging chandelier, they understood that it was something special, something that Remus shared with Virgil and Virgil alone. Whenever Virgil managed to calm Remus down or stopped him from doing something worse than usual, they understood.

It took a lot of work to get Remus to understand something. It took something drastic, something terrible, to get him to understand. He understood very few things. But one of the things he did understand was that Virgil needed to be treated gently, and that was something he never forgot.

Because once you got Remus to understand something, he would always understand it and would never forget.

Ever.


End file.
